Life Insurance For Vegetarians
Summary
An interesting new insurance plan has been introduced by Animal Friends Insurance. The new policy offers lower premiums to vegetarians, based on evidence that they are at a reduced risk than their carnivore counterparts of developing certain diseases. It remains to be seen whether other insurance firms will follow the example set by AFI .
A none profit insurance firm has introducd a scheme which offers vegetarians and fish-eaters a reduced price critical illness .
The deal, thought to be the first of its type, is being brought to the market by Animal Friends Insurance (AFI). The business is offering vegetarians a 7% lower priceon life assurance premiums
The company claimed that veggies ought to pay a lesser cost for the cover, which pays out if the client were to die, because they were less likely to suffer from a list of chronic illnesses, including cancers.
Rebecca Puttey, AFI’s managing director, said that the risk of veggies being diagnosed with certain cancers is reduced by up to 40 per cent and the possibility of them suffering from heart disease is reduced by up to thirty two per cent, but despite this they have, until now, had to pay identical insurance costs as people who eat meat.
She says that AFI believe this is unfair and says the insurers should recognise the idea that being a vegetarian can make have a positive influence on life expectancy and cut its premiums accordingly.
A standard priced policy is also on the market for meat eaters. Both insurance policies are marketed by LV=, which was known as Liverpool Victoria.
In common with normal life policies, a range of factors contribute to the cost of the premium including whether the applicant smokes, their age, sex and weight.
Just at the moment, Animal Friends Insurance is carrying the 7% price reduction itself from the money it gets from LV=. In the future, however, the company’s objective was to offer lower costs on specialist insurance cover. In the business is hoping to sign up enough vegetarians to make it economically viable for LV= to underwrite yet another plan that takes the vegetarian’s diet into account.
Indeed there are welcome savings to be made, a 40-year-oldnon-smoker buying £300,000 worth of life insurance cover might potentially save £393.60 over a twenty year term.
Where life insurance deals is concerned, AFI believes that life insurers should start to treat people that eat meat and non-meat eaters in approaches matching the way they approach smokers and non-smokers. Perhaps others in the insurance industry will do the same.
Some peoplein the insurance industry are doubtful whether there is robust proof that vegetarians live longer, and how any insurer would know that people who had stated that they are vegetarian did not munch on an occasional bacon sandwich.
It’s true that when it comes to smoking there are GP records - if you do smoke it’s likely that your GP is likely to be aware. However, this is not the case when it comes to eating meat, an insurance executive said.
But many veggetarians say that they are not concerned about people falling off the vegetarian ways and suggested that once a vegetarian has become a vegetarian, they do not go back to meat-eating, that’s unlike applicants who smoke who tend to drift out and back again into their habit.
